Russia’s permanent representative to the OSCE Andrei Kelin

VIENNA, May 27. /ITAR-TASS/. There are no Russians among the missing OSCE observers, Andrei Kelin, Russia’s Ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) told ITAR-TASS.

Kelin noted that OSCE does not yet have any information regarding those who could be involved in the observers’ disappearance.

“We know that it happened when the group (of OSCE observers) was returning from Luhansk to Donetsk at a checkpoint that was not there when they were going to to Luhansk,” Kelin said. “They (observers) could be in the nearest settlement,” he added.

“Observers should not be made hostages, they should be released,” Kelin said.

Earlier, the press service of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic told ITAR-TASS that local self-defense forces did not hinder the activity and movement of the OSCE observers. “We did not hinder their (the observers’) activity and have nothing to do with this. We do not know what happened,” the press service said.

According to an OSCE news release, the organization last contacted the monitors at 6.00 pm local time on Monday.